Likewise, [Paul] Simon also got my attention years ago when one of the band members of his South African-derived award winning band (Graceland) was arrested for murder and criminal fraud - killed someone, stole a bunch of money from some charity fund and got caught every which way.
One of the most haunting stories in the history of the blues is that of guitarist Pat Hare. Once a sideman for
Muddy Waters and James Cotton, Hare is credited with one of the earliest examples of distorted "power chords"
playing on Cotton's "Cotton Crop Blues" in 1954. The same year, Hare cut a single on his own, a cover of
Doctor Clayton's jealousy song "I'm Gonna Murder My Baby." Fast forward to 1963, when Hare---by then
mired in alcoholism---shot his girlfriend to death
and shot the cop who came to investigate, this at a time
when Hare was one of Muddy's sidemen. Hare was sentenced to life in prison (during his prison years he
was said to have formed a band called Sounds Incarcerated) and died of cancer in prison in 1980.
Then there was Jim Gordon, remembered best as the drummer for Derek & the Dominos. (The unforgettable
coda to "Layla" was Gordon's composition, married to Eric Clapton's main song, though both fellow Domino
Bobby Whitlock and Graham Nash have argued that Gordon may have pinched the melody from his former
girl friend Rita Coolidge.) Gordon developed mental issues as the 1970s went on and they culminated in his
murdering his mother in a psychotic rage in 1983---only after his arrest (he would be sentenced to 16 years to life)
was he diagnosed as a full-out schizophrenic. His trial judge accepted the diagnosis but rejected any insanity
defense due to a change in California's law on the matter at that time.